


Home

by AnneBlack



Series: Florets [2]
Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: Crushes, F/M, farkle's crush over time, his crush - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-08 04:41:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12856959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnneBlack/pseuds/AnneBlack
Summary: When they’re Fifteen, Farkle is really good at “acting” and Riley is clever.It takes so long for her to realize it.





	Home

When they’re Fifteen, Farkle is really good at “acting” and Riley is clever.

“Hey, Riles!” Farkle beckons her over in the hallway, and she squints as she comes closer. “What?” He sighs. “Ah, just, can you at least act like my girlfriend if you don’t want it to be real?” 

Riley’s eyes widen in realization, and then she launches into a rant about how Smackle keeps staring at him and Isn’t she supposed to be with Lucas? People glance over weirdly, not good enough. 

He laughs at her adorable-ness, even if fake, then leans forward and whispers to her, “I’m going to kiss you,” before crashing his lips onto hers. Riley stiffens but manages to act it out well, allowing him to push her back against the lockers. He can feel the stares and the crowd forming and he lets himself go because hell, if he’s going to be in a fake relationship with the love of his life he’s milking it for all it’s worth. She responds after a moment, smiling against his lips and wrapping her arms around him. She laughs into his mouth and breaks away, hands lingering on his shoulders and chest before slipping away. 

“I thought it was just going to be a peck,” she breathes into his ear and lightly presses her lips to his cheek. He can’t help but grin, and she looks up at him, surprised because the last time he smiled like that was before Texas. Then she grins back at him, the mischievous smile that hasn’t showed up since the beginning of high school. Her eyes are alight with hope, and it is the moment he realizes he is so madly in love with her that he would give up everything to make Pluto a planet again. For her.

It is also the moment he realizes she is his everything, the very thing he needs to live, and the moment he remembers when he used to be hers.

Stupid Freak Face. 

 

When they’re Eighteen, Farkle is an idiot and Riley is amazing.

“Oh my God, Farkle, look!” Riley laughs, handing him a photograph. “Remember when we pretended we were dating?” Farkle laughs back, but his gaze is not on the photographs.  
His parents and many other acquaintances have told her so many things. He’s surprised Riley hasn’t figured it out yet. After the mutual “break-up” they’d become fast friends again—closer than before. Yet she doesn’t know how he feels, how he has felt about her for so long he cannot remember a time he was not in love with her. 

“Farkle?” She’s staring at him curiously. “Are you okay?” He blinks. “Uh, yeah. Any more pictures?” Riley smiles softly as she gives him a small stack of photos. He examines them quietly, shifting in their Matthews’-built living room blanket fort. In all of them it’s the stage of said fake relationship, and in each they look so in love his heart lurches thinking it’s real. Riles gazes at them for a moment, then rolls onto her back and says, “Can I ask you a question?” He nods in response.

“Your family… When we were fake dating they kept telling me about how you still had a crush on me. For years. Do you?” Farkle smiles, “Have a crush on you? No.” Not exactly a lie on his part.

He doesn’t hear her reply because his thoughts are too loud. Do something, do something, do something, his mind whispers and he blurts out, “It’s more than that.”  
She freezes.

“I—I mean—” All efforts to correct himself fail. Riley slowly turns to face him and stammers out, “W—what?” She waits for a response and when it’s clear he’s not going to give her one she says, “Farkle, I’m not mad. What does that mean?”

He shakes his head. “How I feel about you. It’s more than a crush.” She continues to stare at him.

After a long time he looks away and says, “That was really idiotic. Sorry. I have to go to work, so…” She lets him leave, lost in thought.

 

They see each other in different standards after a month, drifting around each other, but then Farkle gets the call at two in the morning.

Maya quickly tells him where they are and how Riley has had a bit too much to drink, and he hears Smackle come up with a logical explanation and correct Maya by telling her that Riley has apparently had way more than “a bit too much” to drink. Maya groans in response and tells him to hurry. He jogs there because it’s nice out and it’s only a few blocks away from his place.

When he finds them he watches for a moment, staring at Riley. It’s not every day he gets to see her like this, legs dangling over the her seat, hair obscuring her face. Maya is trying to get her to put down the bottle of vodka in her hand and Smackle is talking to a familiar blond freak insistently, lingering at Riley’s side as if scared to leave. When Maya sees him she breathes out a sigh of relief and says something to Smackle and Lucas; they exchange numbers.

Farkle marches through the crowd with purpose, drunks getting out of his way as he goes. When he gets there Maya shoves Riley’s jacket into his face, hisses to take care of her, grabs Smackle and leaves.

So they blame him for their best friend’s drunken state.

When she notices him Riley lets Farkle braid her long hair and twist it up out of her face with a purple-cat hair tie he’s been meaning to give her, guiding her out of the pub at the same time. She stumbles trying to walk by herself, and he only just resists the urge to catch her in his arms and kiss her. 

He’s seen her drunk before, once at Maya’s 21st birthday party in which she had painted something other than a purple cat. Well, unless lions counted as cats. The point is, he knows how her brain works when it’s drowning in alcohol. 

She stops in the middle of the sidewalk, whirls to face him, and glares up at him. She’s almost the same height as him, but her eyes meet his nose instead of his gaze.

Aand… now.

“I hate you, Farkle Minkus!” 

It stings. He knows she’s drunk and sleepy, but he takes it to heart anyway.

“You and your—your stupid hair!” Farkle’s taken aback. She hates him because of his hair? What’s wrong with his hair? He’s about to ask but she moves on.

“Those freckles!” Riley pokes a freckle on his upper cheek, thankfully missing his eye. “And that smile!” She continues. “Why do you have such an annoying smile?! God, it’s so distracting!” She pulls on the sleeve of his trademark “Donny Barnes” jacket. “And this! Why do you have to wear this all the time? What god did you trade this for?!

“You know what Yogi asked me today? He asked if I was YOURS! And besides the fact that I’d rather not be referenced as an object, you haven’t done anything! You take me out every day! You sleepover every week! You bring me BREAKFAST IN BED! WE HOLD HANDS! We do everything people in a normal relationship do, but we’re not in one, are we? So what are we? Am I yours? AM I?” 

There it is. The reason why she’s so pissed, the reason she let herself get drunk off her arse. She stands in front of him angrily, dark curls a mess and brown eyes lidded, her cheeks flushed with a mix of the cold and amount of alcohol she’s been drinking. 

She’s gorgeous, and he thinks, is this the end? Is she going to walk away now? 

He’s about to reply when she shushes him, retches, and walks over to the side of the street to puke promptly. Farkle is at her side in an instant, pulling back the hairs that have escaped from her braid bun and rubbing her back.

“Maybe we should stop doing this,” Riley whispers and it takes all his measly strength not to break down, curl up into a ball and die then and there. It’s over, he thinks. They’re done and he’s going to have to let go of everything, let go of her.

He takes her home in silence.

Riley lets him give her a glass of water and wash her face, and she crawls into her old bed slowly. She lays down, surrounding herself with his scent as he pulls a fluffy blanket over her. It grounds her even while she’s high, daisies and purple cats still floating in her mind, but it’s only when she knows he’s gone and the voices of her father and mother disappear when she lets her tears fall.

 

She wakes up to Auggie—August now, he’s always reminding her—staring at her face. “Wake up, Riles,” he says to her, pulling a flannel over an “I Love Pluto” shirt she’d gotten for him a few years ago. She sits up and tenses as she sees Farkle on the other side of the bed, picking up a cup of water and two white pills. He gives them to her wordlessly, smiling at Auggie—August!—in thanks. 

“Farkle called in sick for both of you,” August explains. “So you guys both get like a week off.” He makes a face when Riley says, “Have fun at school.”

Her little brother leaves and they’re silent.

Riley sighs, “My dad isn’t kicking you out? Aren’t you a threat?” The scientist smiles but doesn’t reply, avoiding her gaze. 

“Farkle—”

“I love you,” he blurts out, and though she’s heard him say it a million times before this time it’s different. It still sounds familiar in his voice, like—like the few days before New Year’s, when she had said it to him and he’d said it back. Riley gapes, wondering what she looks like. She tries to say it back but her lips, jaw still dropped, refuse to move.  
His shoulders seem to sag, but he continues. “Riley, I love you and I have loved you for all these years. You—It’s my fault you didn’t know. I always wanted to be your boyfriend, but I was scared. Scared I’d mess things up. Mess us up.”

He laughs then, not his scientist laugh nor his triumphant laugh, but a cold laugh. A laugh that scares her because her mind is racking itself and it can’t find anything that sounds even significantly like that. He isn’t looking at her, instead staring at the empty space of headboard beside her, the place where Maya and Smackle and at least four of her distant friends have slept before. 

“But eff it all, right? I mean, for you, I’ll do it. I can’t promise you it’ll get better, but I love you so much, Riley, I’ll do it all for you. If you want it…” He looks up at her then, and his eyes are filled with so much emotion she has to look away. He stands, startling her as he does because just seconds ago he was as still as the rest of her room—tense with anticipation. She wonders whether he will speak or not. Whether he will look at her and say it again. What if he doesn’t? What if he’s acting for another of his plays? She’s about to ask.

But then he moves. 

Farkle holds out his hand, his eyes meeting hers as he repeats, “If you want it it’s worth the risk. I know your father says a Minkus can’t take the heart of a Matthews, can never be a Matthews’, but if you want it, then Riley, I’m all yours.”

She knows if she takes it, there will be fights, angry words, and far more drunk arguments, and she knows if she takes his hand they will be least likely to survive in this world of darkness. Because she’s, as her friends say, “the ray of sunshine” and he’s the king of Mars. 

She can see a future where they are still there, though, where they and their children Lilly(real name Pluto, but she doesn’t have to know that) and Marcus(nicknamed Mars). Where the rings they exchange at the wedding are the smallest gem and the reddest ruby and her Uncle Josh has proposed to Maya with the approval of his niece months before. Where Charlie comes with his wife and daughter to play with Marcus every week and they become the next Auggie and Ava, and they always have the largest but most intimate Christmases in the Minki house. She can see a future where they are happy and in love and completely, finally satisfied with who they are.

Riley snaps back to her bedroom when he waves his hand in front of her face. “Riley? Riles? Are you okay—?” 

“Yes.” She clears her throat, then says softly, “Farkle, hold out your hand again.” When he does as instructed she smiles up at him. Riley stands up from the bed, wobbling slightly, then looks at Farkle with the softest smile on her face. “I see a lot when I think about us. And I want that to happen. All of it. Even the bad things, because the bad things will make us stronger than ever.” She takes a deep breath, noticing he’s still staring at her. “I love you, Farkle,” she whispers. and it seems to get him out of his trance. 

Farkle smiles at her, a breath of relief escaping his lips as she takes his hand and rubs the top of his ring finger. He looks at her with a confused expression when Riley says, “We should get rings.” 

“Rings?”

“Like an insurance policy.”

Riley grins while Farkle squints at her. “Why in the world would we need an insurance policy?” 

There’s a long silence before she laughs. “Okay, I just want a ring.” Farkle smiles at her goofily. “Rings it is,” he declares and she hugs him tightly.

“Thank you for letting me stay home from school, Farkle.” Riley let go, “But I need to go or I’m going to fail all my classes.” 

“You don’t want to stay?”

“I do, of course I do!” She laughs again, “But you know how I am with school. Mom and Dad know I’m better at doing things than sleeping, and I don’t want to ruin it by staying home from school after being drunk for one night.”

“You nearly puked up everything you drank.” “Besides, Auggie-I-mean-August isn’t going to be home until dinner, and there’s nobody else here.”

“Riley? Minkus?” Maya climbs the other halfway into the window. “I thought you were going back to your dorm.” She raises her eyebrows at the two, dragging her backpack inside. “Did I miss something?”

“No…” Riley says as Farkle says, “Yes.” She glares at him playfully. “Nothing happened. Did Uncle Josh ask you--”

“Ask her what? What did I ask her? I’m pretty sure I didn’t ask her anything,” her uncle says as he strides into the room. “I agree,” Maya grins, taking his hand when he hugs her from behind, “I’m sure you didn’t ask me to marry you and put a adorable, simple, little silver ring on my finger.”

“YAY!” Riley exclaims and Farkle laughs at her adorable-ness again, catching a glimpse of the ring on Maya’s finger. Josh grins and buries his face in his fiancee’s shoulder, holding her hand tightly. “Come on, Riles, don’t embarrass Josh,” Maya says with a smile, her cheeks tinging pink as Josh kisses her on the cheek.  
Farkle pecks Riley on the forehead, twirling her around. “Well, I’m not going to just stand here. I’m going to go make some brunch. Omelettes?”

“Yeah, that’d be perfect. Thank you, Farkle,” Riley smiles as he leaves the room and is suddenly aware of her burning cheeks. Maya grins at her. “Did Farkle tell you?”  
Riley can’t help but giggle as she blurts out, “We’re going to get rings.”

Maya laughs out loud and Josh lets go of her to hug his niece. “She’s been telling me all about you and Farkle. Congratulations.” Riley beams, hugging him back, and they walk to the kitchen as the smell of bellpeppers and eggs and melting cheese fills the air. 

Here, she realizes as she laughs at Farkle attempting to flip Maya’s omelette onto her plate, she’s home. With Maya and her Uncle Josh and Farkle, and Zay and Lucas and Smackle, all of which she’s texted sometime in the last five minutes about everything.

 

Zay:  
FINALLY!!! Tell Boing and Pancakes I said congrats, and you too, Smiley Riley :)

Smackle & Lucas:  
Congratulations!! We’ll be free Monday if you’re still out sick <3

 

Riley grins even wider as Maya leans into her soon-to-be husband, and Farkle sits down beside her, his fingers folding through hers as they smile at each other.  
“I’m home,” she whispers and it’s barely heard, but they all brighten even more.

Riley Matthews has finally found the way home, not with magic or fairies or princesses, but with her lucky uncle Boing, an amazing artist, and a genius named Farkle Minkus.  
He kisses her on the cheek and she’s never felt more sure that she’s in love.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you all for reading!


End file.
